By Ryan L. Schaaf
Editor’s Note: This is Part Two of a new monthly series, The Brief History of the Future of Education. If you missed Part One, you can find it in the prior installment of this series.
Change: Nothing Stays the Same (Van Halen)
Change is rarely comfortable. People naturally seek the familiar—the routines and rhythms that create a sense of security. For many, resisting change becomes a protective habit that supports a fixed mindset. But the pace of change in our world makes resistance both impractical and costly.
Today, change is constant and accelerating. The hardest part is that change can be subtle: we sense that things are shifting, but it can be difficult to identify precisely what has changed and how those changes will ripple through our lives, communities, and institutions.
Innovation: A Process Powered by Change
Disruptive innovation transforms established ways of working and living. Advances in technologies—cloud computing, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, 3D printing, nanotechnology, robotics, new materials and medical breakthroughs—are reshaping virtually every human activity. As scientific output and technological capability expand rapidly, societies experience economic shifts, altered demographic patterns, and cultural changes that affect families, communities and education.
These technologies are not just tools; they are forces that multiply capability and change expectations. As innovation globalizes industries and services, educators and policymakers must consider the deep implications for how we teach and what learners need to know.
Learning in a Disrupted World
What kind of future are we preparing our young people for? To answer that, we must first recognize the major forces reshaping the workforce.
One clear trend is the decline of routine cognitive work. Tasks that follow predictable patterns—such as traditional bookkeeping, data entry, some customer service, help-desk roles, certain programming tasks and legal research—are increasingly automated or outsourced. When work can be expressed as algorithms or automated workflows, software, machines and AI often perform it more quickly and cost-effectively than humans.
Another trend is the growth of contingent and freelance employment. The modern labor market includes many part-time, contract and self-employed roles—a shift commonly described as the Gig Economy. This model produces flexible, adaptable workers who must constantly demonstrate their skills in a competitive marketplace. While gig work offers opportunity and autonomy, it also creates pressure for continuous learning and differentiation.
These shifts mean learners today must acquire different skills to be competitive. Education that focuses primarily on memorization, routine procedures and standardized testing will leave students unprepared for a world in which adaptability and creativity matter more than ever.
The Creative Class
To thrive in this disrupted economy, learners must develop creativity. Richard Florida’s analysis of the “creative class” highlights growing demand for roles that technology cannot easily replace—jobs that require imagination, problem-solving, design-thinking, communication, collaboration and information fluency. These competencies are not easily automated; rather, technology often augments or amplifies them.
The prevailing K–12 model was built for an earlier economic era, one dominated by agriculture and manufacturing where predictable, routine skills sufficed. Today’s economy is organized differently: most workers are in service-oriented and creative roles that require higher-order thinking and lifelong learning habits.
Education needs to evolve from teaching short-term school skills—those needed to pass tests or advance to the next grade—toward cultivating durable, next-generation skills that help students adapt to uncertainty and change. Schools should prioritize teaching students how to learn, how to think critically, how to collaborate effectively, and how to apply knowledge creatively in new contexts.
The next installment in The Brief History of the Future of Education series will take a closer look at the specific next-generation skills learners must develop to succeed in a disrupted world and will outline practical strategies educators can use to prepare today’s students for tomorrow’s challenges.
About this post: This post is part of The Brief History of the Future of Education series. Based on the newly released book written by Ian Jukes and Ryan L. Schaaf, the series examines the “That’s the way we always did it” mindset in schools, explores teaching challenges in the Age of Disruptive Innovation, surveys the learning attributes of the digital generation, considers what learning might look like in the future, identifies essential next-generation skills, and reflects on the evolving roles educators must adopt to remain relevant.
About the Author:
Ryan Schaaf is an Associate Professor of Educational Technology at Notre Dame of Maryland University and a faculty member in the Digital Age Learning and Educational Technology program at Johns Hopkins University. He works with educators to explore game-based learning, the characteristics of modern learners, and emerging technologies and trends that can improve education. Follow him on Twitter @RyanLSchaaf.
This article originally appeared through educational research and media outlets focused on the transition to digital curriculum and the changing landscape of teaching and learning.